


Shades

by Jaina (effervescible)



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: Brief Depictions of Violence, Canon Compliant, Canon deaths, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Suicide, Trick or Treat: Trick, mid-AC3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:27:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26955091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/effervescible/pseuds/Jaina
Summary: Desmond sees dead people. More than he's supposed to, that is.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 26
Collections: Trick or Treat Exchange 2020





	Shades

**Author's Note:**

  * For [YunaBlaze](https://archiveofourown.org/users/YunaBlaze/gifts).



Desmond MIles doesn't believe in ghosts. But clearly, the Grand Temple is fucking haunted.

At first, he figures it's nothing more than the atmosphere of the place, a pervading feeling of "spooky-assedness," as one of his buddies back in Manhattan would have put it. No one has set foot here for centuries, so it should feel abandoned, desolate. Instead, he feels like someone is constantly watching from the shadows — and there are a _lot_ of shadows, thanks to the piss-poor job their lighting equipment is doing. It's no one's fault — this place is too goddamn big and scrounging up enough equipment to make it bright and cheery cannot be a priority on their timetable — but griping about it distracted him from being creeped out, so he gripes and tells himself he's imagining things.

It works, until Rebecca comes up to him while he's taking a break from the Animus and confirms that he is absolutely not imagining things. Rude.

"Someone's down here with us," she says, eyes flickering from side to side, like that something might jump out at them at any minute. "I keep seeing things out of the corner of my eye, like a ghost or something."

Desmond rolls his eyes, mostly because he figures giving her something to focus her ire on might make her feel better. It works; she socks him in the arm. "Ghosts don't exist," he says. "Also, ow."

"I know that, dummy," she says. "I said _like_ a ghost, not actually a ghost. " She frowns. "I think it might be Juno."

Confirmation comes a few days later in an email from Shaun that's waiting for him after a particularly deep dive into his ancestor's memories. Happy fucking Halloween. Almost Halloween.

Later that day when he comes up for conceptual air, Desmond opts for some parkour circuit training, or the closest thing they've got in here. There's no equipment, no marked path, but he's identified a route around the temple that lets him do some running, climbing, and leaping. His father doesn't like it, which is no real change from usual, but he needs it after spending hours-that-feel-like-months-and-years reliving Ratonhnhaké:ton's life. Inside the Animus, the exertion he feels when free-running is indistinguishable from what it feels like in the real world, but Desmond knows the difference. He also knows that between the bleeding effect and the micro-movements his muscles make while he's sorting through the genetic memories, he's getting stronger, not weaker, while he's "asleep."

So yeah, the feelings of stiffness and constraint that follow a session in the Animus are all in his head. But a lot of important things are, so he does the parkour path anyway to shake it off. Shaun has helpfully gathered enough extra spare bedding and other soft materials to make a landing point beneath the most obvious place for a leap of faith. He's not sure whether it's an unspoken gesture of kindness of insurance to make sure he doesn't stupidly crack his head open while working out the kinks. Could be both.

He's seen the specter of Juno a few times during his runs and studiously avoided her, because it's not the time or place for more obnoxiously cryptic conversations. So it's not the double-crossing bitch of a precursor that causes his head to jerk to the side as he stalls on his course, all grace and momentum lost. It's what sounds like a scream — but it's too faint, too far, too quiet to be a cry of pain or a cry for help from one of his team.

Maybe it's a trick of the wind? Not that they have wind down here, but the temple isn't airtight. If there's rough weather out, it could happen. He cocks his head for a moment, listening. He thinks he can hear it, but not quite. It's like it's on the edge of sound. After a moment, he switches to his other sight, somewhat hesitant — it's called Eagle Vision, not Eagle Ears — and jerks his head back immediately.

Outlined in gold is a landscape that doesn't match that of the temple interior. It's inside some kind of building, a small, dingy cell. He doesn't recognize it, or the small crowd of men surrounding a prone figure. His stomach lurches as they pull back, one laughing a vicious laugh as he lifts up a head, ragged flesh hanging from the neck.

Desmond does recommend that face, twisted by pain and death as it is. Malik, of Masyaf. Altair's best friend and right-hand man. He remembers the memory, the horrible news his ancestor had received, but it doesn't make any sense, he wasn't here for this —

The head twists every so slightly towards him, seems to _look_ at him. The lips part and twitch, and he can almost make out the _Desmond_ they're striving to speak if only it had air to do so —

And it's gone. Without him even consciously triggering the change, the gruesome tableau is just — absent, not even leaving an aftereffect against his eyelids, like it had never been.

He rubs the heels of his palms against his eyes. Okay okay okay. That was a hell of an intrusive thought, but brains are weird like that. Way weirder than most scientists are aware of, he knows that much for sure.

Nothing he can do about it now. Desmond tries to put the thought aside as he embarks on the next section of the impromptu course, balancing on a thin beam that leads him into an even darker, quieter area of the temple.

He appreciates the quiet for a little while. Not long enough. Without warning, without effort, his eagle vision comes to life as he glances down and sees another bout of violence below him. Just as many men, just as much ruthlessness, but at least the victim is fighting back this time. Boy, is he. There's too much motion below him to make out details but he sees one, two, three of the attackers fall.

It's not enough. The biggest of the gang surges through and makes a vicious stabbing motion. There's a feminine-sounding shout from somewhere nearby and Desmond realizes he knows that voice, knows what's happening, and knows he's about to witness the death of Yusuf Tazim. A millisecond later, there's a cry of pain and a shout that could have been his name, if it hadn't cut off so suddenly.

He rips himself out of his other sight and staggers back. Time seems to dilate, with a few seconds growing into agonizing minutes. No, no, no, this can't be happening again. He cannot be losing it _again_. Whatever happened deep in the Animus with Clay, it fixed him, he can't be slipping again.

He….doesn't feel like he is, though. Freaked out as he is, _and he is_ , there's none of that familiar sense of losing himself, the sensation that he might drown in someone else's memories. It doesn't feel like the bleeding effect, but what the hell else could it be? What's happening to him?  
'  
Another ten minutes or so goes by before he moves again. Can't stay up here forever, and if any of the others have to come up here to escort him back down, there will be no end to their bitching.

It helps. He's never bought into the usefulness of endorphins, the runner's high and all that, but he can't deny that it feels good. If nothing else, it makes him a little more sure that his body is his own.

He can relax, for a little while. Doesn't mean he's surprised when his vision flashes gold once more and Clay Kaczmarek stands before him.

"God fucking dammit!" Stomping one foot in frustration is pretty childish, but just now he doesn't care. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you can't be here. You're supposed to be dead. _Twice_."

"Hey. Not my doing, Desmond." Glowy-gold Clay raises his hands in supplication and it's only then that he notices the bleed streaming from both his wrists. Of course. That was how he died, wasn't it? The real Clay. "I just want you to remember."

"Remember what?" Clay smiles, and shrugs. "Remember _what?_ "

His words echo in the empty air, because once again, he's alone, with nothing strange in sight.

Desmond wishes this were the bleeding effect. At least then he'd understand what's going on.

He throws himself into the rest of the course, ready to be done with this so he can go to sleep or have a snack or jump back into the Animus. He's already put in plenty of time today, but what they're doing isn't confined to office hours, and the more he thinks about it the less he feels he can rest for a while. Not with his heart pounding like it is, echoing from the center of his chest to the end of each finger and toe.

He runs, jumps and climbs nearly to the end of the course, and standing before the very end is the person he's been half expecting to see. Blonde hair, white shirt stained with blood. The only phantom to appear before him whose death he was actually there for — part of him, anyway, the part that wasn't a million miles away, screaming against Juno's control of him. And maybe unwilling to do anything more, after the visions she gave him. The fact that he's still not sure how much control he could have taken is what's really haunted him the most.

Up until now, anyway. "Lucy." His voice is quiet, regretful. 

"Desmond." She nods, and if it weren't for the shimmer of gold, he could almost believe she's really here. Almost buy that that it was another fakeout, another trick of the Templars and she's not really dead. 

"You want to tell me what's going on?"

She brushes her fingertips against her stomach and the wound there that he gave her. "I want you to remember the cost."

"The cost," he repeats. "The cost of what?"

"Of what's to come," she says. "Whatever you decide. You're going to change the world, Desmond. One way or another. Just...remember that there's always a price."

She's talking cryptic nonsense, maybe not as cryptic as the precursors but close, and yet he thinks he gets it. The people he's seen tonight, lives that ended because someone involved in this endless war thought it was worth it. From where he stands now, he can't swear that it wasn't. But that doesn't erase any of the loss.

He looks at her face and a million words nearly tumble from his lips. Too many to say at once. So he settles for the simplest. "I'm sorry."

"Yeah." One corner of her mouth curls up in a crooked smile. "Me too, Desmond."

And he's alone.

For a minute or so.

"Desmond!" Shaun's voice floats up from below and he glances down to see him near the landing point. "Are you done yet? We think we've identified a new sequence of memories that might lead us somewhere." He straightens his glasses. "I know it's late, but clearly you're not worried about your beauty sleep…"

Desmond pulls out the phone he's got tucked into a zipped jacket pocket. 12:34 a.m.

Happy Halloween, indeed.

"Desmond?"

"Yeah," he says after a moment. "Yeah, I'm with you. Be right there."

He looks back into the shadows, but there's nothing this time. Just him and his thoughts about where all this is going. Which makes it way too crowded up here.

So he leaps, and in an instant, he's gone.


End file.
